Photo: AFP / RAIMON KATAOTAO
The date for the Kiribati presidential – or beretitenti – vote has been set for 25 October.
Notices were published by electoral districts across the country on Friday.
There will now just be three candidates – all from the same party, the ruling Tobwaan Kiribati Party (TKP) – after one TKP candidate, Riteta Iorome, was dropped. There had been no public indication as to why he was not on the ballot.
The three still in the race were the man who has been beretitenti for the past eight years, Taneti Maamau, along with Bauntaake Beia and Kaotitaake Kokoria.
The TKP used its numbers to block any opposition candidate from standing, prompting Tessie Lambourne – the opposition leader in the last parliament – to say the people were being denied a right to have a beretitenti of their choosing.
She said Kiribati was becoming a one-party state while the delivery of basic services in the country was near collapse.
Under a new law at this election, each candidate was required to have provided a copy of their manifesto to the Electoral Commission, with those manifestos due to be published in the Government Gazette by Monday.
According to the constitutional change, the successful candidate will be held to the manifesto commitments by the Electoral Commission for the duration of the four-year term.
Meanwhile, because their candidates had been blocked from standing, the opposition was contemplating a boycott of the nationwide poll.